Month: July 2020

Welcome to Astronomer in Shanghai! Thank you for following my blog and for your interest in my adventures in Shanghai! As you continue to wear masks (like me) and maintain social distancing practices, I hope that my blog illustrates that once the world recovers from this outbreak (which is not now in the US), things will improve. You should all look forward to small interactions with friends and family. I’m sure you’ll find, as I have, that these are the interactions you will cherish. In Shanghai, life has returned to a new normal. The recovery timeline for Shanghai is not applicable to the US and new outbreaks may still occur. However, we are all in this together and if we wear masks and cooperate with social distancing guidelines things will improve.

If you find my blog interesting or enjoyable, please subscribe and let me know! To subscribe, enter your name and e-mail on the right side of the page. Once subscribed, you’ll receive an e-mail with each new post. If you have any questions about how I’ve dealt with covid-19 or my life in Shanghai, please ask. Instructions are on the “To Comment” page. Also, please share this blog with anyone who needs reassurance that eventually life will return to a semblance of normalcy.

Life in Shanghai

I hope that you all continue to remain safe and healthy. Hopefully, you, your friends, and your family are all taking covid-19 seriously and are continuing to maintain social distancing practices and wear masks when you go outside. It’s regularly hot and humid in Shanghai, so I understand that wearing masks in this weather can be uncomfortable; however, you all need to wear masks to help slow the spread of covid-19. One thing I hope that you’ve learned from this blog is that despite covid-19, you can still do some fun activities (including while wearing a mask). Whether it’s running, hiking, going for walks, or finding ways to connect with friends and family in a safe manner, I hope that all of you are able to find some moments of enjoyment this summer.

For much of this blog, I haven’t discussed a lot about the relationship between the US and China. Although, I have discussed how the foreign student ban will likely lead to fewer scholars and educated workers coming from China to the US. I’ve avoided this topic, mostly because I don’t have any valuable insights to share. However, the relationship appears to have further deteriorated in the past week, with the closing of the Chinese consulate in Houston, which was then followed by the closing of the consulate in Chengdu (where the Panda reserves are). From my perspective, the inconsistent messaging from the current administration is problematic. They seem to jump around on which issues they care about deems important and remain unaware that the US is no longer able to boss China around. Furthermore, the trade war cannot be won and is only negatively impacting both countries. However, if you want an educated discussion of the topic, I highly recommend listening to a recent episode of the Make Me Smart Podcast from Marketplace with Kai Ryssdal and Molly Wood (linked below). They interview Jennifer Pak, a marketplace reporter based in Shanghai. While much of what was discussed was troublesome, I greatly appreciated learning their insights and opinions.

U.S.-China relations are bad, but are they ‘new Cold War’ bad?

As reassurance for you all, I don’t believe that this will impact my work (and none of my expat friends, particularly those who have lived here for a while, seem super concerned). In terms of my work, China is heavily invested in growing it’s scientific research (with international scholars), particularly in Astronomy with the upcoming launch of the Chinese Space Station Telescope.

In terms of covid-19, I continue to remain concerned about the lack of improvement I’ve seen in the US. There are now over 4 million cases in the US and I can’t understand why both governors and the current administration aren’t taking this more seriously. Not everyone is as lucky as my parents in NY to have had the firm hand of Gov. Cuomo. In stark contrast, the situation remains stable in China. There are cases on the rise in Hong Kong and in Xinjiang (but these are only on the range of tens to hundreds, not millions). In Beijing, there are now only 42 active cases, so that outbreak has been effectively contained. In Shanghai, there are just 18 cases (all imported from people returning to China). The recovery rate in Shanghai is at 96.6% and the recovery rate for China as a whole is at 93.1%. So, the situation appears to be under control.

On the Astronomy side of things, this was a relatively productive week. I spent most of my week working on my Luminosity Function analysis, where I finally solved why my results didn’t match the previously published results (there were some nuances to the evaluation of good and bad data that we were doing differently)! So, it feels great to have finally made some tangible progress on that front. Unfortunately, I still am working on solving the bugs related to the calibration of my DES SMHM relation analysis. Somewhat unsurprisingly and weirdly normal at this point, I have multiple Zoom meetings at different times each week, including our AstroCoffee presentations (morning), Zu Group meetings (afternoon), and a very late night DES telecon. Overall, I definitely have enough projects and meetings to keep me busy!

It is now the start of the real summer weather in Shanghai, which means it’s hot and humid (but not rainy). Most days it reaches about 90 (or hotter), but with high humidity, so it gets pretty uncomfortable. Despite that, I still went for two runs (when it was a little cooler) this week! Even though it’s so hot outside, Shanghai is still very beautiful!

Additionally, I saw lots of cats this week! Sadly, there are a lot of strays in Shanghai (although, I’m never 100% sure if cats are strays or just outdoor cats). The one in the store is not a stray.

I think I can now say, that I have a pretty active social life, which is very nice (and a pleasant change from my pre-covid normalcy)! I’m really happy to be part of a few (intertwined) friend groups! On Wednesday, my group of friends got together again for another improv game night! For those of you who are unfamiliar with improv games, they’re basically acting/theater games where you act out different scenarios, mostly trying to be funny. I’m having a lot of fun with it and slowly getting better! It’s a great opportunity to be silly.

The highlight of my weekend was making Cherry Jam with my friends Heather and Hannah Maia! Unlike my Mom’s cherry jam (which is great), we made sweet cherry jam, which turned out fantastically!

As you can see, we had a blast! From pitting the cherries (which was much less messy than when Emmet and I would do it and cover the whole dining room table with cherry juice) to juicing the lemons to smushing the cherries, to cooking the jam (and boiling the jars to sanitize them), we were able to make some delicious cherry jam in a few hours! I also used some of my previously made peach jam to make jam squares (my Mom’s signature cookie) for the first time in Shanghai, which were a hit!

Overall, we had a fantastic afternoon! I think this may be the best jam yet! We figured out that the liquid pectin we got wasn’t actually 100% pectin (it had sugar and water as the primary ingredients, unlike certo, which is what my Mom uses), so using the powdered pectin (and knowing how much to use) made the consistency of the jam much nicer! I look forward to enjoying it more in upcoming weeks! Also, we’re going to be making fig jam as well as citrus marmalade later this summer/fall!

To follow up such a fun Saturday, on Sunday, Heather and Shimi organized a board game afternoon! We played Cards Against Humanity, which is always a little more interesting when everyone is from different places (our group included Americans, Israelis, Chinese, and French people), Codenames, and Bananagrams! It was a lot of fun! I really enjoyed playing codenames again, since I have fond memories of playing with my friends in Ann Arbor during my last night in Michigan. 🙂

Throughout my week, I also saw a lot of other cool things I wanted to share! I love the Shanghai skyline!

Food in Shanghai

In addition to the delicious food that I made this week, which was General Tso’s chickpeas, vegan mozzarella, and roasted chickpeas, I had two fantastic meals out!

On Monday, I was invited to a dinner for Community Leaders who are working on topics related to social justice and Black Lives Matter. I am as part of the leadership for the Moishe House BLM discussion series and organizer of the Kehilat Shanghai/ Moishe House Solidarity Shabbat. It was very interesting meeting different leaders from many different communities, and hopefully we can do some activities together. Most are associated with business or US political groups. The dinner was at an amazing vegetarian buffet! So, I had to take tons of photos of the fantastic food (most of which I tried).

In an attempt to summarize everything, there was fruit juices, grilled mushrooms and eggplant, different types of seitan (gluten, including delicious gluten balls) and tofu dishes, sauteed mushrooms and other vegetables, greens, cauliflower, bamboo, pineapple rice, different dim sum (dumplings and baozi), as well as beautiful deserts (mine was a raspberry tart)! This was a vegan/vegetarian heaven! It was located right behind the Jing’an temple, so I’ll definitely be back!

On Friday, we had our Community Shabbat (more on that later). We had a delicious Chinese dinner! We had tofu, fruit (the purple fruit is dragonfruit or pitaya), smoked tofu (which was funky), amazing eggplant, and tomato with tofu skins! The eggplant was my favorite!

As you can see, there’s tons of amazing vegan and vegetarian food in Shanghai and I look forward to trying more! Additionally, although I forgot to take a photo, Hannah Maia made an amazing marbled red bean and black sesame flavored challah!

Jewish Life in Shanghai

This week, we had our second joint Kehilat Shanghai/Moishe House Shabbat! We had 15 people and one dog 🙂 come for the dinner and service! I had the pleasure of leading services again! I lead services with Emmet while we were seniors at Brown and I really enjoy the opportunity to lead the community! It was great to gather members of the community (including some new faces) to celebrate Shabbat and enjoy fascinating conversations ranging from the situation in the US, to a discussion of cosmology and life in the Universe (since generally everyone loves asking the Astronomer questions!). A special highlight for me was that my friends Kate and Ilan brought Pina!

Overall, this was another really fun week! I’m so glad I’ve found such a wonderful friend group! This upcoming week I think should be a little bit quieter (though I’ve been wrong before). So, I hope to make more progress on my research, too.

I hope that you enjoyed hearing about my week and seeing the delicious food I enjoyed and the fantastic jam I made! I hope this update reminds you that life really isn’t that different here in China and that for you as well things will improve (though the process to get there can’t be rushed). If you have any questions, comments, or concerns about the current covid-19 situation, please let me know. If you want to talk about how to stay positive and productive, reach out. I want to help support you and assure all of you in any way that I can.

In peace,
Jesse

Welcome to Astronomer in Shanghai! Thank you for following my blog and for your interest in my adventures in Shanghai! As many of you are hopefully continuing to socially distance, I hope that my blog illustrates that once the world recovers from this outbreak (which is not now in the US), things will improve. You should all look forward to small interactions with friends and family. I’m sure you’ll find, as I have, how much more you appreciate those now. In Shanghai, life has returned to a new normal. The recovery timeline for Shanghai is not applicable to the US and new outbreaks may still occur. However, we are all in this together and if we wear masks and cooperate with social distancing guidelines things will improve.

If you find my blog interesting or enjoyable, please subscribe and let me know! To subscribe, enter your name and e-mail on the right side of the page. Once subscribed, you’ll receive an e-mail with each new post. If you have any questions about how I’ve dealt with covid-19 or my life in Shanghai, please ask. Instructions are on the “To Comment” page. Also, please share this blog with anyone who needs reassurance that eventually life will return to a semblance of normalcy.

Life in Shanghai

I hope that this latest entry continues to find you, your family, and your friends all staying safe and healthy. Hopefully, you’re remaining vigilant and continuing to cooperate with social distance guidelines and wearing masks. I’m sure that this has been a difficult summer so far. Unlike past years (if you’re being safe and smart), you haven’t been able to go on vacation, visit friends and family, and do normal summer fun. However, I hope that even while taking social distancing seriously, you’ve been able to do some fun activities. Whether it’s going for hikes, picking fruit, social distant gatherings, or getting ice cream to beat the heat, hopefully you’ve found a few ways to brighten your days.

Since I discussed the topic last week, I do want to say that I’m pleased that the US government rescinded it’s restriction on foreign students, thus allowing them to stay in the US if their university is online only. However, I still maintain that the current nationalist (and racist) rhetoric emanating from the White House will likely have long term ramifications on the US. I believe that many scholars, scientists, and other skilled workers may choose to either go to more welcoming countries or remain in their home countries because they feel that the US no longer welcomes them. Thus, further emphasizing the importance of changing the leadership in this November.

I also want to take the time to mark the passing of Congressman and Civil Rights Activist John Lewis. I first became familiar with Congressman Lewis’s life story through his powerful graphic novel autobiography series March. If you haven’t read all three volumes, I highly recommend them (they’re accessible for all ages). March provides insight into Congressman Lewis’s actions throughout the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. Congressman Lewis was a titan in the Civil Rights movement whose actions left a lasting imprint on America. I hope that we can all continue to work to make a better more inclusive world to honor his legacy. Congressman Lewis may you Rest in Power!

Before I discuss the covid-19 situation in China, I want to remark at how demoralizing the situation in the US has become. It is utterly ridiculous that wearing masks and listening to scientists has become so heavily politicized. Moreover, it was just 11 days ago that the US hit 3 million cases of covid-19. Since then the situation has only worsened and there are now over 3.7 million cases. Only Russia, India, and Brazil have had more than 0.7 million cases. This is not good company to keep. Though you can see similarities in the current leadership. It’s high time that everyone in the US stop acting selfishly. Americans must realize that the benefit of the whole far outweighs any personal benefit. The economy should not be a priority. The situation will only improve if everyone takes social distancing and mask wearing seriously. I fear that the situation will not improve without drastic, harsh, and draconian action.

In China, the situation has remained stable. There are reports of a small outbreak in Xinjiang (where the Uygur’s live), but that outbreak appears to be contained. In Beijing, the number of cases is down to 132, while in Shanghai the number is at 25 (all imported). For Shanghai, the recovery rate is at 95.6%, while for China as a whole, the recovery rate is at 93.7%. So, as I’ve previously stated, the spread of the virus can be quenched if strong and swift action is taken.

On the Astronomy side of things, this was a somewhat frustrating week. I spent a lot of time working on different aspects of my DES stellar mass – halo mass relation analysis only to realize that the calibration that I was using was incorrect (so I have to redo things). However, from experience, it’s better to realize that now and not once the paper’s been submitted. Also, this type of thing happens a lot in science. Over the years, I’ve come to realize that I rarely do any of my analyses only a few times, most things are done multiple times, not only to verify results, but to remove bugs in our code. Along with meetings with colleagues/collaborators/friends in the US, much of my work interactions have remained via Zoom. We’ve continued having AstroCoffee and Zu Group Meetings. For those of you who are curious, I’m still working from home (my research supervisor is fine with that) and many of the grad students have not been allowed back on campus. It’s still unclear whether students will return in the fall.

This was a fairly rainy week. Although, unlike previous weeks, the weather was cool! It was in the 70s for a few days, so in between the rain, I was able to sneak in 3 runs, which were great! This week also appeared to mark the end of the Plum Rain season. This year was the longest Plum Rain season on record in over 20 years! Sadly for me, the end of Plum Rain season means hot and slightly less humid weather for the rest of July and August.

Following up last week’s very social week, this week I also did a lot of fun things with friends. On Tuesday, I organized the Kehilat Shanghai and Moishe House Trivia Night! My friend David served as the quiz master, covering a wide variety of topics from history, mythology, and music, to current events, movies, and even a comics question! This time, my team won! I had a fantastic time and helped contribute to my team’s win! My best categories were mythology and history. And of course I got the comics question! Still waiting on some more sports themed questions though!

On Wednesday night, my friend Heather organized an improv games night! Heather and some of her other friends had taken an improv class in the fall, so this was an opportunity to practice and relearn (or learn in my case) some of the techniques they had learned. I was very intrigued to try improv since I find lecturing (when I give a presentation I don’t write out a talk, I just prep slides) and teaching to be very improvisational, so I thought that these kind of activities would make me better at thinking on my feet. Overall, this was a fantastically fun evening. I haven’t laughed this much in a long time. This was a really nice opportunity to relax with friends and have fun!

Lastly, on Saturday evening, I got together with my friends Heather and Shimi to play games at a cafe near where I live. In China, all the fancier shopping areas are still lit up.

We played backgammon (Heather and I did much better against Shimi this time), Quirkle, and Bananagrams! Game nights bring back fond memories of playing games with my fellow Michigan grad students Juliette, Ryan, Ben, Juan, Paco, and Gillen as well as game nights with my family and Lollie, Peri, and Kevin in Saratoga. So, I’m really glad to be doing them here! Also, one benefit of being in China, is that it’s really easy to get new games. I ordered Anomia via Taobao this morning and it’s already shipping. So, if anyone has any great game recommendations, let me know!

Food in Shanghai

On Saturday, I got lunch with one of my friends at a newer Vegan restaurant near Xujiahui. This restaurant had very pretty and delicious food!

We had a salad, tofu pad thai, pesto zoodles, and an acai bowl! Everything was really delicious. My favorites were the Pad thai and the Acai bowl (which was really refreshing on such a hot day).

Additionally, I’ve continued to do a lot of cooking. This week, I made vegan brownies, walnut “meat” tacos, and vegan cashew cream cheese. As a note, if any of the things that I make sound interesting to you, let me know. I’m happy to share recipes!

Jewish Life in Shanghai

On Friday evening, I joined with members of the Kehilat Shanghai community for Family Shabbat! This is a smaller Shabbat gathering hosted at one of the members homes mostly for families with children (though other members without kids are welcome and invited). I wanted to join since as a Kehilat board member, I’m trying to get to know members of the community better. Here you can see me distracted playing Othello with two of the hosts’ children. This brought back a lot of fond memories. One, Emmet and I used to play Othello on the computer all the time when we were younger and two, this reminded me a lot of visiting with my cousin Margaret and playing with her sons before dinner while I was living in Ann Arbor. While most of the night was spent talking with the parents, I really enjoyed the opportunity to play with the kids! It’s really nice to feel like I’m part of the larger Jewish community (and not just the community of 20s/30s living in Shanghai). Also, the brownies I made were a hit!

On Sunday, Moishe House hosted a bagel brunch (I made vegan cream cheese). There’s something very comforting about enjoying a good bagel, so I’m glad I get to do it here in Shanghai! This was a great opportunity to relax and chat with friends as well as getting to spend some time with Lucky!

As per usual, there was a lot of commiserating about the situation in the US. Many of the sentiments I mentioned earlier, such as the frustrations about the lack of effort to take this seriously or trust scientists were echoed this afternoon.

Overall, this was another very fun week! I’m very happy to say that I’ve settled into a routine and have a nice diverse group of friends that I get to hang out with! This upcoming week I’ll have a few more fun, social, and Jewish events as well as hopefully making some headway in my research (I should have some new results on my Luminosity Function analysis!).

I hope that you enjoyed hearing about my week! Overall, I hope this update reminds you what a normal and social week looks like (though the process to get there can’t be rushed). If you have any questions, comments, or concerns about the current covid-19 situation, please let me know. If you need to talk about how to stay positive and productive, please reach out. I want to help support you and assure all of you in any way that I can.

In peace,
Jesse

Welcome to Astronomer in Shanghai! Thank you for following my blog and for your interest in my adventures in Shanghai! As many of you are hopefully continuing to socially distance, I hope that my blog illustrates that once the world recovers from this outbreak (which is not now in the US), things will improve. You should all treasure the small daily interactions. In Shanghai, life has returned to a new normal. The recovery timeline for Shanghai is not applicable to the US and new outbreaks may still occur. However, we are all in this together and if we wear masks and cooperate with social distancing guidelines things will improve.

If you find my blog interesting or enjoyable, please subscribe and let me know! To subscribe, enter your name and e-mail on the right side of the page. Once subscribed, you’ll receive an e-mail with each new post. If you have any questions about how I’ve dealt with covid-19 or my life in Shanghai, please ask. Instructions are on the “To Comment” page. Also, please share this blog with anyone who needs reassurance that eventually life will return to a semblance of normalcy.

Life in Shanghai

I hope that this latest entry finds all of you continuing to be safe, maintaining social distancing practices, and healthy. As I’ve done before, I want to emphasizing the importance and necessity of wearing masks. Masks are one of the few effective methods to slow the spread of covid-19. While they are not a 100% guaranteed solution, they have been proven to effectively limit the spread of covid-19. Moreover, masks alone are not enough, it’s important to continue to expect the government (particularly in the US) to mandate increased testing and tracking of people who are sick. While tracking may seem like a violation of privacy, it’s done here, and I feel a sense of ease knowing that everyone has a green QR code indicating that they’re healthy. So, I again ask you to continue to take covid-19 seriously and demand the same of your friends and family.

The current number of cases in the US has now hit over 3 million. Therefore, I remain increasingly concerned about my family and friends (as well as all of you) who are in the US. I hope that this concerns you as well. Unfortunately, it seems as though the US is too late to effectively halt the spread of covid-19 without immediate, unilateral, and potentially draconian action (regardless of the impact on the economy). However, I grow continually pessimistic that such action will occur because all the current administration cares about is money.

Due to other recent news, this week, I’d like to share my views about the recent policy by the current administration to not allow international students to remain in the US if their universities remain on-line only. This is a senseless action taken to punish students for a global pandemic, which is no individual student’s fault. While I think that this is a harmful decision by the US government, I believe that the long-term implications may be more profound. Having both grown up in an academic environment and began my own journey in Academia, I think it’s abundantly clear how beneficial it is to have both a racially, ethnically, and geographically diverse set of students, faculty, and staff. Moreover, the message that the US is currently sending to the world is that they disagree with me and that the US does not want you here. I believe that such a position will eventually lead to many leading scholars and scientists choosing to not pursue degrees, faculty positions, and jobs in the United States because they do not feel welcome. Having spoken with my research supervisor about some of these issues, I’m aware of how much more difficult it has been (in the last year) for students to come from China to the US to get their Ph.D. This action is the latest in the racist and xenophobic actions taken by the current administration that in my opinion leaves the US in a precarious position, not just for the future of academia, but for how it’s viewed by the rest of the world. This action, on top of the continued systematic oppression and racism towards black people that exists in the US continue to emphasize the long term problems caused or enhanced by the current administration.

Now, lets transition back to discussing covid-19. The situation has continued to improve here in China, particularly in Beijing. The number of active cases has decreased to 240 (down from 328). In Shanghai, there 28 active cases (all imported from returnees to China). The current recovery rate in Shanghai is 95.2%, while the rate for China as a whole is 93.9%. In comparison to the US, I think this emphasizes that it is possible to control the spread of covid-19, when swift and scientifically backed actions are taken. Hopefully, smarter heads at the state level will prevail.

In terms of research, this was a fairly productive week. I had the 300 Project collaboration meeting every afternoon. This was a very interesting opportunity for me to learn a lot about the different research that members of the 300 collaboration are working on. It also allowed me to present some of my previous work and explain how I plan to use these simulations, which should hopefully lead to some interesting papers in the coming years. Other than the meeting, I spent a lot of time working on my DES stellar mass – halo mass relation research as well as on some of my research on the spectroscopic completeness of DESI clusters. Given the collaboration meeting, it’s unsurprising that I spent a lot of time on Zoom. In addition, I had our SJTU AstroCoffee as well as our Zu Group meeting. Since the semester is over, we no longer have weekly colloquiums.

The combination of the collaboration meeting along with mostly miserable weather (either very humid, hot, or raining), unfortunately led me to only go for 1 run this week. It’s supposed to be a little bit cooler during this upcoming week, so hopefully I’ll be able to go for some nice runs then (even if there’s some rain)! Additionally, Sunday was the hottest day I’ve experienced in Shanghai. It was 100 degrees (feels like 118), with ~60% humidity. Apparently, this is the type of weather that is typical of Shanghai in the summer (so I guess it’ll be a very hot summer). Despite spending a lot of time inside, I still saw some beautiful flowers and paintings.

Overall, this was an incredibly social week. I had events every day from Wednesday through Sunday.

On Wednesday, Moishe House hosted the first of a series of discussions on Black Lives Matter. I helped organize the series with Hannah Maia and the discussion was led by Clem, who is a member of the black community as well as an educator who’s lived in Shanghai for 15 years. The discussion focused mostly on definitions of terms relating to racism, prejudice, and discrimination, particularly in US. I’ve uploaded the slides with the definitions we discussed so that you can see what we talked about. I found the discussion to be very honest and interesting. We had a long discussion on what racism means and who can be racist. One concept that I’ve struggled with is whether their is a difference between systemic racism and someone being racist. I personally think that there is, but it’s a very nuanced and complicated argument. We also spoke about intersectionality and how we choose to identify ourselves. I found the discussions to be very informative and this was a great way to make everyone in the group comfortable with one another so that we can move on to discuss some more difficult topics. I’m very much looking forward to continuing this series and to gain greater insight into how I can become a better ally.

In contrast to Wednesday’s heavier discussion, on Thursday, I had dinner with my friends Kate and Ilan and got to meet their new dog, Pina! They think Pina is a Samoyed breed.

Pina is beautiful! She’s very soft and fluffy. More importantly, she’s super friendly and calm. It was a lot of fun getting to play with her! She’s one of the most beautiful dogs I’ve seen in Shanghai.

On Friday, I had dinner with my friends, Heather and Shimi. Heather made a fantastic pasta salad with artichokes, sun dried tomatoes, basil, and goat cheese and I made a roasted vegetable salad. Then for desert, Heather made a delicious vegan banana cream pie!

Heather is a fantastic cook! I always treasure getting the opportunity getting to enjoy her cooking! Afterwards, Shimi taught Heather and I how to play Backgammon. I learned the basic rules when I did Birthright, but unsurprisingly Shimi knew all the key strategies (and how to roll doubles or maybe that was just luck) and won. I look forward to trying to win next time, though! 🙂

After dinner, the three of us (as well as some of my other friends from the Moishe House community) went to Casey’s (one of the Moishe House residents) farewell comedy show. It’s been a very long time (I think since I was at Brown) since I’ve seen any live comedy. While the acts may have been a little more NSFW than I was expecting, I still had a lot of fun and we all had a lot of laughs!

Following the comedy show, on Saturday, Moishe House had a farewell party for Casey, who’s moving back to the United States. To give her a proper sendoff, I baked a vegan lemon cake, topped with a blueberry compote! It was another successful new recipe and I was thrilled with how lemon forward the cake was!

Lastly, on Sunday, my friend David (from the Moishe House community) invited friends to go GoKart racing for his birthday! Despite the brutal heat, I joined in for a fun afternoon. I think the last time I went GoKart racing was when I was 4-5 in Lake George (but my Mom can probably actually remember, since it was not a fun experience for her). This time, I got to drive, which was a lot of fun! It was pretty stressful though, with lots of bumping into other riders, cars stalling it, collisions, and a lot of slamming on the brakes.

Overall, it was still a lot of fun (though I am not very good at it).

Jewish Life in Shanghai

On Saturday, Kehilat Shanghai hosted a summer Taco Party! This event was designed to bring members of the community (both those with kids and those without) together! As you can see, the event was a huge success! We had about 50 people come, which was fantastic. It’s great to know which community members are still in Shanghai and for me, it was a really nice opportunity to meet some of the community members who I’d only briefly met. I also met the founders of Kehilat Beijing, who were visiting from Beijing. Kehilat Beijing has been around for much longer than Kehilat Shanghai. I’m looking forward to visiting Beijing once the 14 day travel restrictions have ended. Overall, it was really nice to see the community together, especially since other than Passover, we haven’t really done this in a long time.

This was a very fun week, filled with with lots of time spent with friends! This upcoming week should be a little bit quieter, and without the conference, hopefully I’ll be able to make some more headway on the many different research projects that I’m currently juggling.

I hope that you enjoyed hearing about my fun adventures this week! Overall, I hope my update reminds you that eventually things will return to normal (though this is not a process that can be rushed). If you have any questions, comments, or concerns about the current covid-19 situation, please let me know. If you need to talk about how to stay positive and productive , please reach out. I want to help support you and assure all of you in any way that I can.

In peace,
Jesse

Welcome to Astronomer in Shanghai! Thank you for following my blog and for your interest in my adventures in Shanghai! As covid-19 hopefully continues to keep many of you socially distancing, I hope that my blog illustrates that once the world recovers from this outbreak (which is not now in the US), things will improve. You should all treasure the small daily interactions. In Shanghai, life has returned to a new normal. The recovery timeline for Shanghai is not applicable to the US and new outbreaks may still occur. However, we are all in this together and if we wear masks and cooperate with social distancing guidelines things will improve.

If you find my blog interesting or enjoyable, please subscribe and let me know! To subscribe, enter your name and e-mail on the right side of the page. Once subscribed, you’ll receive an e-mail with each new post. If you have any questions about how I’ve dealt with covid-19 or my life in Shanghai, please ask. Instructions are on the “To Comment” page. Also, please share this blog with anyone who needs reassurance that eventually life will return to a semblance of normalcy.

Life in Shanghai

I hope that all of you reading this continue to remain safe and healthy. Regardless of where you live I hope that you’re wearing masks when you’re outside and are following social distancing guidelines. If you chose to do anything to mark the 4th of July, I hope that you and your family were smart and stayed safe. Please continue to take covid-19 seriously and remain vigilant.

Even though Saturday was the 4th of July, it’s hard to feel proud about being an American right now. I don’t know if it’s a combination of living abroad or the multi-national diversity among my group of friends, but it’s becoming exceedingly difficult to view the current situation in the US with any sort of hope or positivity. The combination of events over the last few months have led to the point where I (as well as some of my other ex-pat friends) feel shame to be American. It’s increasingly apparent that the current administration has failed to protect the health and well-being of the American people and that instead of admitting their failures, they’ve chosen to give up in hopes for a magic cure. Additionally, instead of trying to unite the country the current administration seeks only to incite division. Being in Shanghai, I don’t access everything that’s happening in the US at the same time (due to the time difference); however, it’s very concerning that every time I wake up I see reports that the number of cases is continuing to rise in many states and that those states and the government are doing little in response. While I’m heartened that my family and friends tell me that they’re wearing masks and remaining socially distant, it’s very scary to know that this is not the case for the majority of people in the US. While I know it seems draconian to enforce mask wearing (which was done in Shanghai in January, February, and March) I feel like unless either states or at least businesses insist on people wearing masks nothing will change. It’s also incredibly embarrassing when I hear people complain about being told to wear a mask. It’s so easy and does not impact your ability to breath (I do it when I run). Even though I’m sure many of you are approaching this situation with extreme caution, I implore you to talk to your friends and neighbors and try to convince them that the only way things can improve is if we as a country take this seriously and start wearing masks, actually following social distance guidelines, and stop being selfish and acting with only our interests in mind.

The situation in China has continued to move in the right direction. While Beijing is still shutdown and 14 day quarantines are required for anyone who travels to the capitol, over the last week, there have been very few new cases. In Beijing there are now 328 cases (up just 17 from last week). In Shanghai, there have been a few more imported cases and the total is currently 28. This makes the recovery rate 95.1% in Shanghai and 93.9% in China as a whole. So, as you can see from the example in Beijing, if the government chose to take strict and swift action, the outbreaks can be quelled and reduced in a matter of weeks.

In terms of my research this was a productive and eventful week. I spent a lot of time working on my DES research and on the Luminosity Function Research. I finally solved part of the bug with the Luminosity Function, so I’m now working on running/implementing the solution. But, progress is good and it feels great to have figured out why the shape I measured wasn’t correct. I also have begun doing more DESI research identifying the clusters whose central galaxies are not covered by DESI as potential secondary targets. So, I’ve had my research focus split in multiple directions. On top of that on Tuesday, I had the opportunity to present at the Harvard Center for Astrophysics’ Galaxy Cluster group meeting (via Zoom). It was great having my brother in attendance! I thought my presentation went very well and it was really nice hearing positive feedback and thoughtful questions about my research. 🙂 This week I’ll have another presentation as well since I recently joined the 300 collaboration (a team that uses simulations to study galaxy clusters and other astrophysical phenomena) and they’re having a group meeting all week. Thankfully, the 300 collaboration is based in Spain, so my talk is at a comfortable 4:45 pm China time! 🙂 On top of all that, we had our regular Zu Group meetings, SJTU Colloquium, and AstroCoffee. So, it was a very eventful week.

Much to my surprise, on Tuesday and Wednesday we had low humidity! Which was amazing!! It was warm, but it was so comfortable to go running when I wasn’t dripping with sweat after the first mile. Overall, I was able to go for 3 runs this week! I am going to start looking for a gym soon, since it’s pretty clear that this is not the norm (this coming week is thunderstorms every day). Below you can see some of the highlights from my runs and walks this week, including some very cute cats!

Additionally, I also wanted to share some photos of neighborhoods near where I live. If you look closely at the food market, you can see a humongous zucchini/cucumber! I have no idea how you would cook or eat that! These photos highlight that there are still parts of Shanghai that feel small and less like a cosmopolitan city.

Despite all of my work, this was a very fun week! On Wednesday, my friend Hannah Maia and I made Lychee jam! While it was lots of fun making Peach jam with my friend Heather, this was a completely new experience, since it’s something I’ve never had before and a flavor that even my Mom hasn’t made (and she’s made all the good flavors!).

To make lychee jam, we first removed the skin from the outside of the lychees (you can’t eat the skin, it’s spiky) and pitted them. Then we smushed the lychees and added some lemon juice. Lychees are very juicy, so the mixture was much more liquidy. Then we began cooking the jam, adding sugar and pectin. Lychees have no natural pectin, so we had to add a ton of pectin to get the jam to solidify. We ended up reboiling it, since we realized after we initially jarred it we needed more pectin.

Overall, we were left with some very pretty and yummy jam! While it may not look like much, those are 2 500ml jars. My Mom’s normal jam jar is 100ml, so it’s a good amount. My main conundrum is what to do with lychee jam. Lychees are a very sweet and interestingly textured fruit that definitely wouldn’t work on a peanut butter and jelly sandwich so, I guess I’ll be experimenting with some deserts!

On top of jam making, I had a very social weekend! On Friday night, Heather organized a surprise birthday party for Shimi (which was great, because he was actually surprised!). Then on Saturday, Heather and Shimi organized a 4th of July vegetarian potluck! I’ll save a discussion of the amazing food for later. While I don’t think any of the three Americans in attendance felt particularly patriotic, the 4th of July was just an excuse to get together and enjoy each others company. It was great spending Friday night and Saturday hanging out with friends and having interesting conversations on topics ranging from Black Lives Matter and the covid-19 situation in the US to improv comedy, tennis, music and food! I continue to be grateful to have found some a warm and fun-spirited group of friends!

Food in Shanghai

On Friday (before the surprise party), Hannah Maia and I ordered vegetarian Chinese food. Hannah Maia taught me how to use the Chinese app Elema, which is kind of like Postmates (but you can also order groceries through it). I haven’t done food delivery before and I was surprised by how quick it was (our food came in less than 30 minutes!). I continue to be amazed by how seamlessly technology is integrated into all aspects of life here.

We had eggplant (which was so soft and delicious), sauteed greens, seitan, rice noodles with veggies (which were fantastic), and mountain yam! It’s great to know that i can get yummy vegetarian food without even leaving my apartment!

As I mentioned earlier, on Saturday Heather and Shimi hosted a 4th of July potluck! I arrived early and made Tempeh Burgers and Buffalo Cauliflower (using the Lunchroom’s recipe from Ann Arbor), with Heather! It was a lot of fun cooking together and definitely helped get all the amazing food done in time. In addition to what I made, we enjoyed homemade seitan sausages, chana masala, and asparagus salad as well as Blueberry pie, watermelon, and chocolate/peanut butter/date protein balls! Here’s the amazing spread courtesy of Shimi, who’s a very talented photographer!

I hope that these photos make you both jealous and hungry! There was so much delicious food! You can see how much I’m enjoying it as I’m mid chew in the photo above. 🙂 It’s great fun to share homemade food with friends and it’s always a treat when people enjoy what you make (which they did :))! Even though I’m not feeling patriotic, it was really nice having the opportunity to spend the day with friends and brought back fond memories of 4th of July barbecues with my fellow grad students and postdocs at Michigan!

Overall, this was a fun week filled with friends and lots of delicious food. This upcoming week, I have the 300 conference, so I’ll be trying to get as much research done as possible in the morning/early afternoon. Hopefully my presentation will go just as well! Additionally, the Moishe House is hosting a Black Lives Matter discussion/learning night, which should be a very important and powerful discussion (it’s the first in a series of events).

I hope that you enjoyed seeing and reading about my culinary adventures this week! I hope that it made you hungry. Overall, I hope my update reminds you that eventually things will resemble what you’re used to (after the covid-19 pandemic ends, not in the middle). If you have any questions, comments, or concerns about the current covid-19 situation, please let me know. If you need to talk about how to stay positive and productive , please reach out. I want to help support you and assure all of you in any way that I can.

In peace,
Jesse